


Wild Rose

by yuutsuhime



Series: Rose†Thorn [2]
Category: The Caligula Effect (Video Game)
Genre: Awkward First Times, Bad Driving, Belligerent Sexual Tension, Character Study, Clit Grinding, Communication, Explicit Consent, F/F, Friends With Benefits, Gender Dysphoria, Hurt/Comfort, Messy Feelings, Messy Oral Sex, Mutual Masturbation, Post-Canon, Relationship Study, Trans Female Thorn (Caligula)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-20
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-14 14:29:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28796916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuutsuhime/pseuds/yuutsuhime
Summary: After a failed hookup, Thorn's friendship with the female protagonist spirals into a terrifying, messy, inexorably hopeful series of intimate encounters.
Relationships: Female Protagonist/Thorn
Series: Rose†Thorn [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2046104
Kudos: 6





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> There should be more erotica about people failing at sex and having a blast anyway. I'm burned out of idealized porn. I want messy human beings in messy relationships having genuinely intimate, realistic sex. This is my attempt to write that.
> 
> At this point, Thorn and Luca have essentially diverged into OCs: FeMC is always a blank slate, and we have no idea who Thorn is without her grief. The connection to canon is tantamount to implication at this point, which I'm ok with, because the canon is transphobic as fuck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning for some pretty intense dysphoria written from personal experience being trans; also brief self harm ideation, and internalized transphobia.

At Shin-Yokohama station, harsh fluorescent workplaces preside over the gentle threat of rain, and Luca wears a day's customer service on her face like smudged eyeliner. She's a ticket clerk, dancing a thousand trips per week across a 2004 touch screen, and it hardly fits her air of bleached delinquency. _I'm a performer by trade,_ she'd explained, pressing her head into Thorn's clean chest. _I know how to make myself do things._

Thorn still doesn't understand what that meant.

Thorn is unemployed, and meets her on Fridays. She isn't sure what the rest of her week is for—her ailing mother, maybe, or the scraps of online friendship her electronic music brings in. Whatever she can salvage after thirteen years wasted in the closet.

Luca falls asleep on Thorn's shoulder before the subway arrives at Katakurachō. It's a bony, exhausted, self-conscious sort of intimacy. Friendship, probably.

A sticker posted on the train door shows a turtle watching as a rabbit gets his leg caught in the door. _Don't rush for the train,_ the turtle shouts, with a helpful translation in Portuguese, and Thorn thinks about all the ways she could be trapped in the sliding doors of an accelerating relationship. Speed stretches the city into parallel trails of light—girls and boys confessing to each other by the bike rack after school, Family Mart, Kiosk, Seven-Eleven. A high rise full of futures. Thorn is thirty-one.

Luca is drooling on Thorn's sleeve.

"Hey," Thorn says.

"Shit, my bad," Luca groans. She wipes Thorn with her uniform and passes out again until Sakuragichō.

The night air on the platform is a simple mixture of crickets and family cars. As the cross-guards lift, Thorn walks along lines on the pavement, and Luca follows at her own pace, chewing her fingernails. Thorn has always walked way too fast. _You should slow down and smell the flowers,_ Thorn's obaasan told her when she was a boy. _You'll only ever remember being impatient._

 _Good things come to those who wait,_ Thorn's mother had added. She tended more towards raw hope than action.

Thorn keeps walking. Friendship, probably. Stable and lonely around bouts of impulsive emotion.

She had her first kiss three weeks ago, about five minutes after the first time she ever wore a dress. It tasted like Luca's spit and she spent the next five minutes in the bathroom trying not to fall in.

The fear was never about whether Luca would like her back. The fear was that she'd leave first.

The moon reflects in cold puddles on the asphalt. Thorn should hold Luca's hand.

She doesn't.

* * *

At the apartment Luca and Thorn stand on opposite sides of the elevator.

  1. Thorn presses the button for twelve.

"It's fifteen," Luca says.

  2.   3.   4.   5.   6.   7.   8.   9.   10. "Do you still wanna fuck?" Luca says.

  11.   12. The elevator doors open for an eternity. Courage spills from Thorn's heart down the crack into the elevator shaft. The carpet is the most interesting carpet Thorn has ever set foot on.

"Yeah," Thorn stutters. She presses the button to close the door and nothing happens. "Why isn't there a thirteenth floor?"

"I dunno," Luca says.



  1.   2. "I forgot condoms," Thorn says.




"It's fine, I don't have a uterus," Luca says, fumbling her keys.

Thorn briefly considers what that means.

The apartment is the same as before: a collection of scraped surfaces and worn fabric that speaks more to poverty than interior design. It's messy—cozy, even—and the safety makes Thorn even more anxious.

"Okay," Thorn starts. She isn't sure where her virginity is physically located, but she can feel it staring her to death like it's the harbinger of whatever the fuck is going on in Thorn's pants. "Now what?"

"Whatever you're thinking about."

Thorn is staring into Luca's eyes. It's not supposed to be an escalation. Her face is just in the way.

"Hey," Luca breathes, impossibly close, enough that Thorn breathes in body heat. She can tell Luca's lips are chapped. Maybe Thorn's lips are also chapped, but it's not like she can just go to the bathroom to put on chapstick when—

"Just kiss me already," Luca says.

Thorn does.

"You," Luca admires. She brushes some of Thorn's hair behind her ear. "You always forget to pucker."

Thorn swallows. "What?"

"You know," Luca says. "Kinda like this?"

"I'm supposed to be doing that?"

Luca shrugs. "Most people do."

A dagger of jealousy rocks through Thorn's gut. It's a reminder. Luca isn't a virgin. She's been with so many other women, and _actual_ women at that, not people like Thorn who—

"Hey," Luca says. "Are you good?"

"Am I bad at kissing?"

"I mean, you don't have much experience kissing, right?"

"Yeah," Thorn admits. It kind of makes her want to cry, and she pushes it back. She'll deal with it later. Maybe. For now, she's on the cusp of going all the way and all she has to do is not fuck it up.

"Yeah," Luca repeats. "You're learning. It's cute."

Thorn tries again, wondering if making out with someone always requires so much attention to detail. The number of ways Thorn could move her mouth or use her hands or voice or legs are endless and uncontrollable, and she always finds the wrong way to combine everything. It's like one of those fighting games at arcades where you just get overwhelmed and press buttons at random until you lose, and Thorn is probably losing.

"You can touch more than just my face, if you want," Luca says.

Right. Thorn should have known. Of course she's supposed to be doing that—why wasn't she? Luca's hands have been on Thorn's back this whole time, doing exactly what should make Thorn feel relaxed, and Thorn has been standing there like her skeleton is preserved on display at an anatomical museum.

The back of Luca's shirt is warm with sweat, and Thorn can feel those plastic loop things that change the length of bra straps—touching the bra kind of makes Thorn feel like a rapist, especially when Thorn is this... Thorn hates the word 'hard'. Not many words have been kind to her.

Luca runs her hands over Thorn's chest. Thorn feels nothing. It reminds her that her own bra is useless and her chest is as flat as it was before, and Luca grinds into her thigh which is really, _really_ dangerous. If this was porn Thorn would probably be turned on, and Thorn is apparently turned on right now—

Luca moans. Thorn is touching her chest. It's incredibly soft. This is probably what Thorn would have if she was the right gender at birth. She could have worn the right school uniform and gone to girls' clubs and looked at herself in the mirror and felt anything beyond empty resignation—

They make it to the bed. Luca's eyes are wild and hungry and she's so fucking hot and Thorn deserves none of it—

"Touch me," Luca says.

"How?"

"Just," Luca stutters. "I'm soaking wet, just put your fingers inside—"

"I don't know how."

"Just curl them up, like this—"

Thorn is panicking. She's doing everything wrong. Her fingernails are still too sharp and she's moving at the wrong rhythm and the wrong depth and this wouldn't be a problem if Thorn figured things out with her own vagina, but—

"Not there, up a bit further—"

"I can't do it—"

"No, no, no, you're fine. You got this—"

"I don't know."

"Thorn, are you good?"

"I don't know."

"Okay," Luca says. "Okay. We're stopping. It's okay. What's wrong?"

"I don't know."

"Do you need me to—"

"I just don't know, okay? I don't know. I don't know what's happening. I don't—"

"Thorn, it's okay," Luca repeats.

Thorn hyperventilates. Everything is wrong. She can smell Luca on her fingers and that kind of makes her want die of shame. Thorn has used knives before. Sat on the toilet with a sheathed box cutter against her penis, her arms and legs sliced clean and parallel like the ragged edges of books—she's never had the courage to actually cut through—

"Do you hate me?" Thorn says.

"Never."

"Not even because—"

"Never."

"I—" Thorn chokes. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay. I was pushing you, and I shouldn't have—"

"No, I'm sorry about—" Thorn gestures over her whole body. "I'm sorry about _this_ —"

Luca pauses. "Why? That's the girl I like."

"But I'm just—" Thorn shakes. "I'm fucked up! Look at me! Why would you ever take this when you could have anyone else?"

Something changes in the air.

"Alright," Luca says. "That one hurt."

"I'm hurting you," Thorn repeats.

"I—" Luca starts. "Yeah. What you just said? This isn't just about you."

Thorn stops talking.

Eventually, she throws her jacket back on and leaves.


	2. Chapter 2

Something about the distance tells Thorn that it's over.

She's not used to being the bigger person. She's lost friends, thrown punches, drawn blood, and embodied her own self-hatred so much that the hatred became her self. Never really fixed anything. Just watched the hatred fell in love.

"Oh," Luca says.

Thorn shrinks into a poster, looking everything like a stray dog that's wandered into the train station to shake itself dry. Pigeons are like that, too. Unintelligent, but hungry and brave by necessity.

"I fucked up," Thorn says.

"And you want to talk about it here?"

"You didn't reply to my texts."

"I was thinking."

Thorn shivers. Sparse footsteps echo across the concourse, and the station is so clean that it's threatening, like tendrils of Thorn's psychosis could creep through the turnstiles and coalesce into hands big enough to choke. Her heartbeat is stuck in her throat.

"Well, you're here," Luca says. "You haven't been invited, but you're here."

"I'm sorry," Thorn says. "I care, and I want to make things right."

"Okay," Luca says. "I don't want to sound cruel, because there are reasons why you think the way you do, but we've had this discussion before. I can't bear the brunt of your self-hatred."

"I understand," Thorn says. "I'm sorry. ~~I'm sorry this is who I am.~~ "

"So what happened?"

"I don't know. I just wanted to seem like I knew what I was doing. I didn't want you to be disappointed."

Guilt unexpectedly flashes behind Luca's frustration. "Do you feel like I coerced you?"

"No," Thorn admits. The manipulative part of Thorn's brain wants to say yes just to win the argument, but she stamps it out. "Definitely not."

"Alright," Luca frowns. "I know you have feelings about it, but like, we both know that you're—"

"A virgin," Thorn says.

"Inexperienced," Luca finishes. "I feel like you're operating in this context of like, proving yourself to me, and that's... The kind of judgments you're fearing are outside the scope of how I think. The only possible way you could have disappointed me is if you weren't being honest with yourself, and that's basically what happened. Sex isn't a situation where you endure negative feelings just to get a good grade at the end. Sex is a conversation."

"How do you mean?"

"I mean, I didn't want to have sex because I had an outcome in mind. I just wanted _you_. I wanted us to figure it out. Like, together. By sharing how we feel."

Thorn thinks. Something about the phrase _I wanted you_ makes a thousand butterflies die in her stomach.

~~"Why do you even bother with me?" Thorn says.~~

"I try my best to be attentive," Luca continues. "But I can't read your mind. I need you to talk to me."

"I will."

"Good. I also need to talk to you, because when you said I 'could have anyone else'—I don't know, I felt like you were calling me a slut in a bad way. Like, what's going on there?"

"I say dumb shit when I'm panicking," Thorn says.

"What you say still matters. Like, I don't super want to get into detail, but I've been branded a slut for a _while_ , and I've been burned to the ground multiple times because of it. I mean, I _am_ a slut, but I know what I want, and I'm in control of myself, and that's it. You don't get to tell me I'm wrong."

~~"Do you hate me?" Thorn says.~~

"I'm sorry," Thorn says. "I totally understand."

"I know what you're trying to say, but I wanna be clear, you _don't_ totally understand—and that's okay. I haven't told you everything, and I don't want to. Yet. Or maybe ever. It's on me, and I do my best with what I'm comfortable with, but right now that's not a lot."

Thorn nods. "Thanks for trusting me."

Luca smiles a bit. "Cool. I don't want this to be all about me. Got anything you wanna talk over?"

Thorn nods again, becoming vastly, acutely aware of the station: a beacon of wasted light and unoccupied reflective surfaces against a sea of wind. Whenever buildings are this empty, Thorn imagines herself walking upside-down on the ceiling to sit on the edge, letting gravity coax her legs into the sky. It would be a gentle pull. The whole world would be above her.

"What are we?" Thorn says.

"I dunno," Luca says. She scrapes gum off the underside of the bench and appears horrifyingly close to eating it. "Weird and undefined? Whatever we want?"

"What do you want?"

"Right now? I want us to be okay. I wanna be with people I care about, and eat good food, and figure out what I'm doing with my life, and maybe kiss a few times along the way. And I wanna get out of here before last train."

Thorn smiles. Kind of. She's not very good at smiling.

* * *

At night, Sakuragichō opens up like a heart. Veins and conduits snake in every direction, through reflections, disturbing puddles on the cobblestone, eventually consumed into the darkness or the bay. It's the kind of beauty that hides between nightclubs and after bars, appearing only through the back window of a taxi, exhausted, while air conditioning dissipates the driver's sweat.

Luca's hand is warm. Raw, stained with work and missed stamps. Her unbuttoned sleeve scrapes Thorn's wrist with every other step.

"Sorry I fucked up our first time," Thorn says, unprompted.

Luca kicks a rock, and tightens her grip a bit.

"It's cool," Luca says. "I don't wanna pressure you, though. If you want there to be a next time, I think you should initiate."

Thorn kicks the rock again. The light from Family Mart feels a lot like an audience.

"How should I do that?" Thorn says.

"Honestly, you can just shove down and go for it," Luca says. "Or like, you know. Directly ask me if I want to have sex."

Thorn trips over the rock and it rolls into a drain. Hotels stare into the back of Thorn's head. There are probably people having sex in the hotel right now. The parking garage across the street was the prelude, and the parked car is probably still warm, and maybe the kisses happen the right way and everything makes sense. Porn isn't reality but it's probably closer than whatever Thorn is capable of.

Thorn keeps thinking about the word 'friend'. She has former friends, and dead friends, and a long list of people she's alienated. Maybe she's only ever wanted a friend, but with Luca the word 'friend' never feels like enough. Greed is what that's called, probably.

"Are you good?" Luca says.

~~"I'm fine," Thorn says.~~

"Overwhelmed," Thorn says.

"I get it. Opening up takes time," Luca says, squeezing Thorn's hand. Thorn is surprised to remember she has hands.

"I'm paranoid about you giving up on me."

"I haven't," Luca says, matter-of-fact. "Even if you feel like you don't deserve me—hell, even if you _actually_ don't deserve me—right now, I haven't."

"Will you eventually?" Thorn blurts.

"You know I can't promise anything about the future," Luca says. "Everything ends, Thorn. It's devastating, and it's the truth."

"I know," Thorn says. ~~"I don't want it to."~~

"Trust me," Luca says. "Right now? I want you."

The inside of Thorn's head is a thunderstorm, and electricity is escaping into the air between them. It barely fits into the elevator.

"God, you have such puppy eyes," Luca says.

Thorn's face burns. "What do you want to happen?"

  1. Luca stares at the elevator door until it closes.

"I want you to do what feels right," she says. "Not for me. For you."

  2.   3.   4.   5.   6. Thorn slams her cheekbone into Luca's nose.

"Son of a bitch!" Luca exclaims.

"Fuck! I'm so fucking sorry!"

  7. "It's fine," Luca laughs. "It happens. Do I have a nosebleed?"

"No."

  8.   9.   10.   11. "I'm so sorry," Thorn says.

  12. "You don't gotta take yourself so seriously," Luca says. "Just trust me, okay? I thought it was cute."

Thorn manages to blush further. What was that saying, again? Every thorn has its rose?



  1. "Hey," Luca says. "Punch me with your face again."

  2. Thorn kisses her.




"Hold on," Luca says. "Does playful teasing genuinely make you feel bad?"

"It's fine. I know you're just trying to break ice."

"But is it fun for you?"

Thorn smiles against Luca's face. "It helps."

Luca kisses back. Thorn wonders if France really is the country with the highest kiss depth, or if it's improperly named because of Eurocentric colonization—

"Was that too much tongue?" Luca says.

Thorn reciprocates. It's weird to think about how every piece of food Luca has eaten since she was like, eight, has touched the front tooth that Thorn just licked.

When the door shuts, Thorn hears how deeply she's breathing. Jackets hit the floor: a tile watercolor painting of dried salt and kicked-off shoes that Thorn could definitely start sweeping as an excuse to—Thorn doesn't know. It's not that she wants to escape, but she tends to pace around thresholds instead of jumping, and Luca's eyes are especially certain and even more dangerous—

Heels bump against furniture, and Thorn is vaguely conscious that they're moving backwards through the studio. More of Luca's outfit should go on the floor but she isn't sure how to ask—

"Tell me how you feel," Luca says.

Thorn grins. "I like making out."

"God, me too," Luca breathes. "What else do you like?"

"I don't know, holding hands? Other normal stuff?"

"You are so cute," Luca says, enunciating every word with Thorn's hands. "Let me rephrase. Nothing is going to happen unless you tell me you want it. No matter how hot and bothered I get, _nothing_ —and I swear to God, if you use this to tease me I _will_ hold back but you _will_ wreck me."

Thorn swallows. "What are you okay with?"

Luca does something with her eyelashes that makes Thorn's heart trip over a crack in the sidewalk. "Just do it. I want what you want."

Something about her cavalier attitude makes Thorn a little concerned, but Luca has so much experience that she's probably got everything under control by now.

"Can we try again, and see what happens?"

"Absolutely," Luca says. "Green to go, yellow to slow, red to stop?"

Thorn nods, wondering about the sex appeal of traffic lights, and then kind of gags when most of Luca's hair falls in her mouth. It's the last thing she holds onto before the world descends into spit and questions: _can I kiss you_ : yes; _can I kiss your neck_ : yes; _can I pull your shirt up_ : ~~sorry this is all I have~~ yes, please; _god, you have such an amazing figure_ : ~~maybe for a trans girl~~ thanks; _can I sit on you while we kiss,_ fuck, please—

"Pretty girl," Luca breathes. Fingers trace the lace around Thorn's bralette, and Thorn can't be squirming this much just because she's ticklish—

"Favorite color?" Luca says.

"Black. I mean green," Thorn pants. She's never heard her own voice like this before. She hopes it's not as bad as she sounds on phone calls.

Luca smirks. Thorn still can't comprehend her eyes. _You can take this off of me,_ she says, and Thorn can't figure out how Luca's arms ever got in her t-shirt or where the fucking bra clasp is so she just hugs her until Luca remembers the clasp is on the front and takes it off like it's not even a big deal—

Thorn's hands reach and cradle Luca's breasts and _you don't have to be so gentle_ , she says; so Thorn is gentle, because Thorn can only be gentle. There's no way Luca could fake a blush like that, or not want to grind on Thorn's thigh like that. This is real, and Thorn is doing this, and _fuck,_ Luca says, _fuck, your mouth feels so good on my tits_ —sex is so unexpectedly wet, and Thorn is nowhere close to orgasm but she feels herself overflowing, like her heart is finally the size of her heart—

Thorn is crying.

"Hey," Luca says, failing to swallow the arousal out of her voice. "I'm here. It's okay—"

"I know," Thorn chokes. "That's why it's so—"

"I've got you, okay? I've got you."

"I just never thought—do you really—"

"I want you," Luca says.

"Fuck," Thorn sobs. "Why? I—I don't know why—"

"Happy tears?"

Thorn nods as fingers comb through her hair. She probably needs one of those conditioner products that keep getting recommended on YouTube ever since she updated the gender on her Google advertising profile.

"You deserve so much more than what the world has ever given you," Luca whispers.

Thorn stops. "Isn't that what that magnet on your fridge says?"

"Well, it's the fucking truth, you goon. Deal with it."

Thorn resumes crying. It's gone from normal crying to ugly crying, and there is so much fluid coming out of her face that it's almost like that thing in porn where twelve or so dudes ejaculate on the same girl—god, why is Thorn like this—

"It's okay. Let it all out," Luca chokes. "God, fuck, now I'm tearing up."

* * *

"That happened," Thorn says.

"Do you feel better?"

Thorn nods. Luca is absently tracing her hysterectomy scar in the light of some late-1980s samurai drama. The editor seems to have increased the color contrast to highlight the samurai's pores, and now his face looks like an orange. Men have so many pores, and Thorn remembers having even more acne.

Luca cringes with her whole body.

"What?" Thorn says.

"Nothing. I just remembered something awkward I did in junior high."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I was like, kind of flirting with this girl, and I never fucking flossed my teeth enough so—"

Thorn scrunches up her face. "Oh no."

"So a chunk of plaque flew out of my mouth into her hair, and she didn't notice. And then I was like, holy shit, this girl who I'm in love with is gonna go around with my fucking plaque in her hair for the rest of the day unless I do something, so I just kind of like, grabbed it."

"And then what?"

"She noticed. And she didn't raise hell or anything. She just whispered 'don't touch me' under her breath and never talked to me again."

"Yeah, that's about how junior high felt."

"Ugh, I was such a gay kid, too. Just completely hopeless. I'm still fucking hopeless, honestly."

"Me, too," Thorn says. "I used to joke about being trapped in a man's body. Every girl I ever liked wasn't straight."

"Oh, honey."

"That and I liked Utena way too much. Never really reflected on it until last week."

"Utena's my shit," Luca says. "Triggering as balls, but it's a damn good watch. We love a lesbian prince."

Thorn nods. Her left arm is asleep, but it might be a social faux-pas to move it—actually, the entire couch is _really_ uncomfortable like this. Thorn's nose is right in Luca's scalp and she probably isn't supposed to notice that scalps have a smell, but—

"Now what?" Thorn says.

"I dunno," Luca says. "Did you nut?"

"Oh god. No. Did you?"

"No. Do you wanna?"

Thorn's brain stops. It feels a bit like being called on in class when she hasn't read the material, so she makes up an excuse on the spot: "Maybe next time?"

"Alright," Luca says. Her eye contact is deadly. "I can make that happen."

Thorn shivers.

"Let's get cleaned up," Luca says.

"Yeah," Thorn says, making no motion to get up. Luca gets up instead and throws her shirt back on without a bra. It's a really good look. Thorn still isn't moving.

"I said you should go get cleaned up."

"I know," Thorn dismisses. She feels the storm rolling back in, electric and humid, surging rain against the window.

"Just gonna sit there and think about me?"

Thorn nods. She feels her pulse in her gums. Maybe that means she should finally go see a dentist after a decade of stubborn apathy—

"Thorn," Luca says. "Whatever you're thinking of, just do it."

At this angle, the armrest is probably in the way, and most of Thorn's body is in shadow. She trembles, and reaches her hand into her shorts—

"Oh, _fuck_ ," Luca says. "Oh, fuck, you're really doing this—"

Thorn closes her eyes, and rubs tiny circles over ~~the head of her dick~~ her clit. The zipper digs uncomfortably into her wrist, and the snap isn't exactly quiet either—

"Tell me what you want. Please," Luca breathes. "Can I touch you?"

"No. Just this," Thorn says.

"Can I touch myself?"

Thorn nods too many times. She isn't sure which parts of her ~~penis~~ ~~vagina~~ genitals are the most sensitive, but she knows what they're called on an anatomical diagram. It's like in eighth grade when teachers separated the girls from the boys, and Thorn's group watched a video from the 1970s where a boy has a wet dream and learns why his penis keeps getting hard and what it's supposed to do, and how only the girls had periods—now Thorn has an alarm on her phone that tells her when she should wear a pad, but that still doesn't feel authentic—

Luca leans against the kitchen counter, illuminated by the stove light and the occasional flash of lightning, pinching her nipple through her shirt while her other hand moves shamelessly, audibly wet—

Thorn ~~strokes~~ fingers herself faster. She's still nowhere close to orgasm but she's ~~hard~~ aroused, and she should probably find a safe direction to aim just so nothing ends up needing dry cleaning, although Luca doesn't seem to have any concern about filth—

"You're doing so good," Luca says, "God, just look at you. You probably make the cutest faces when you come—"

Thorn loses her breath. She can't remember the name for that place between the ~~glans~~ clit and the urethra, but whenever she touches it her body recoils in arousal, and it's almost too sensitive to continue—

"Your moans," Luca says. "God, Thorn, your moans—"

Thorn isn't listening. She watches as Luca stumbles, knocking a dirty kitchen knife onto the tile by her bare feet, only briefly considering the danger—

"This is what you do to me," Luca says. Thorn would give anything to have that voice. To hear that coming out of her own mouth— _God, this is what you do to me,_ Luca chokes again, and Thorn writhes, her hair falling lopsided over her face as she turns to watch Luca crumple to the ground—

"Did you—" Thorn says.

"I'm close, I'm really—" Luca pants. "Do you wanna come with me?"

"Please," Thorn says.

"Okay. I'm counting from ten, okay? Nine. Eight—"

Thorn squeezes herself so hard it almost hurts. She wants this. She wants this so much, but—

"Seven. Six—wait, oh my god, fuck, one—sorry—"

Thorn hits a wall. All she can do is watch as Luca comes in shudders and bangs her head on the oven, a ridiculous, metal sound mixing with the kind of whimpers that would have had Thorn coming on the spot if she was alone. Maybe Thorn is fucked up. Maybe her eighth grade health teacher was right, and watching porn really does fuck up your sex drive and make real sex impossible without years of therapy. Why can't Thorn come? This is exactly the kind of thing that shoulddo it, and Thorn isn't even freaking out, it's just—

"Oh, _fuck_ ," Luca says.

"Are you good?"

"I'm so fucking good I can't feel my legs," Luca says. "Fuck. You?"

"I, like, can't."

"Can't what?"

"I can't come."

"Ever?"

"Right now. I can't—"

"Eh, happens all the time. No shame," Luca says. She picks the knife up off the floor, briefly considering it before she tosses it back onto the stove.

It's probably time for Thorn to give up and wash herself off. Unbelievably, Luca is licking her own come off her hand, and—well, the kitchen sink is _right there_ —is that a normal thing that women do? She doesn't want to call Luca gross, because maybe there's a reason, but—

"Yeah, I'm disgusting," Luca says. "Want a kiss?"

"Um, no," Thorn says, promptly sequestering herself in the bathroom.

Whatever just happened was sex, right? Thorn felt female, right? She isn't sure. The specter of her virginity is still lurking in the shadows, playing cards with her internalized transphobia in front of the altar of her grief, but for now, she barely hears the shuffling.

Thorn sits on the toilet and wipes Luca's discharge off her legs.

It's awkward. She isn't sure if it's a boundary violation to smell it, but there's no other way to tell if she's clean. Luca's bath towel glares from its perch on the shower door, like it has more of a claim to intimacy than Thorn does.

Thorn dries herself with her own shirt.

The mirror reflects a confused girl who somehow understands more than she does. Like she's actually thirty-one, and hasn't just been seventeen for fourteen years.

Maybe something about it makes sense.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story is set in 2017 so I can vicariously live out the COVID fantasy of eating inside a restaurant. Also disclaimer don't drive distracted or do foreplay in public; it's not safe.

Thorn spends an awful lot of time in the Shinkansen waiting room for someone who doesn't even have a ticket. She's never quite been agoraphobic, but she only knows how to take stock of her surroundings once her feet are planted. Public spaces have a way of coercing her into masculinity, or at least highlighting that she's transgender; stares and distance communicate more than voices ever could.

Schoolgirls have so much time to be girls. In adulthood, Thorn barely has time for jealousy.

"Do you want tempura?" Luca says. Her tie is already loosened into unprofessionalism. Thorn can only bring herself to nod.

"What's wrong?"

~~Thorn sighs. "I just heard some kid asking her mom whether I was a man or a woman, and her mom said I was a man."~~

"It's nothing," Thorn answers, averting her eyes.

Crowds bustle overwhelmingly, and all Thorn can do is keep pace in Luca's slipstream and try not to be the size of a person.

"Are we going the right way?" Thorn says.

"Huh? Oh, yeah, I drove today."

"You have a car?"

"Yes, Thorn. I'm gay and I can drive."

"Since when have you had a car?"

"Since my dad died three years ago."

Thorn cringes. Stairs to the parking lot gradate from shiny, customer-oriented advertising to naked concrete in just a few flights, and something about that feels a lot like a metaphor for Thorn's social aptitude. "Sorry."

"Don't be. He was a fucking asshole. I wrote an acoustic album about it. Hold on, I think I might have parked on P2."

"What kind of car?"

"It's the kind of white Toyota compact an alcoholic would buy to impress his ex-wife—god, where the _fuck_ is it? Is that ramp P2 or P3?"

"That's P1."

"Wait, no—I think down there is P4, not P2. So if I'm on P2 we'd have to go back up—"

"No, P4 is the highest. It goes down to B3."

"Shit, I might be on B," Luca says. "Wait... alright, what's going on? You look super down."

 ~~"It's nothing,"~~ Thorn says.

"I guess," Thorn says.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

~~"On my way here some women stopped me from going on the women-only car on the subway," Thorn says.~~

Thorn stops. Talking about shame always feels like opening up weird old leftovers from the back of the fridge, or that time when Thorn was 13 and so afraid of her mom finding out that she masturbated that she accumulated used tissues in her closet for two years: a sort of quiet, disgusting horror. The parking garage stares down, its lights a thousand eyes in a ribcage of concrete tongues—this is vulnerability, Thorn realizes. That's what its name is.

"There it is," Luca says, noticeably less energetic. "Just throw whatever's on the seat in the back."

~~"I know there's nothing you can do about this, but..." Thorn starts. "I don't know. I'm just questioning whether I count as a woman."~~

"Hey," Luca says, entering the car. "We're good, right?"

"Yeah. It's not about you, it's just... people."

"Are you still okay with going out?"

Thorn keeps flicking the latch on the glove compartment. "Yeah, it's just... Being trans is supposed to be the best thing that's ever happened to me, and I guess it is, but the world seems intent to make me hate myself for it."

"I get why you feel that way," Luca says

~~"No, you don't," Thorn says. "How could you understand it if you don't live it? Can you understand being mocked, degraded, stared at, misgendered, and deadnamed at every fucking turn of your life? And I'm supposed to act like it just hurts a normal amount? I'm supposed to accept that other people fuck up and feel okay about it because they're trying? No! I can't even do normal shit like go to a restaurant without worrying about the server deadnaming me because the bank won't change my debit card!"~~

~~"Honestly, maybe I deserve it. Maybe I've been such a shitty person to everyone around me that how I feel about it shouldn't matter."~~

Thorn nods. "That means a lot."

~~"To be honest, you're the one person in the world who accepts me like this. I don't know why I deserve that. It's so much to ask for and you just give it freely."~~

"You're allowed to grieve that you're trans," Luca says. "That's real pain, and real life. _And_ , that's the person I care about."

~~Thorn lets herself cry.~~

Luca extracts Thorn's hand from the glove compartment, where she's been mindlessly caressing Luca's car insurance. "Hey. I'm here, okay? Wanna get some food in you?"

"Yeah," Thorn says. Thorn gets carsick if she's reading, but otherwise driving helps her calm down, especially at night, when—

The car jerks to a halt.

"Oh shit," Luca says.

"What the fuck?" Thorn says, suddenly alert. "What was that?"

Luca cranes her neck. "Just ass-to-ass rear-ended that car. Looks fine. Is anything dripping on the pavement?"

"Want me to get out and look?"

"No. If you can't see anything from here we're good. Sometimes she gets a bit squirty when I'm rough with her."

"Oh," Thorn says. Luca still isn't wearing her seatbelt. It's probably fine.

"So how the fuck are we supposed to get out of here? We're still on B2."

"You have to turn right at that arrow," Thorn says.

"Here?" Luca says, driving past it.

"No, you just looped around—"

"Son of a bitch! I'm just gonna reverse—"

"Don't fucking reverse again!" Thorn exclaims. "There's a fucking SUV right behind us!"

"Well, he should stop riding my ass! I know how to throw hands—oh god, why is this ramp sloping down instead of up—"

"We're just looping around again—"

"It's B2! We're back on fucking B2!"

"Do you see the arrow," Thorn demands. "No. No. Up. On the right. Other right."

"Why is that guy still following so close? If this was the highway I'd brake check the shit out him—"

"Please don't."

"Fuck! Fuck this stupid parking ramp! Now I can't fucking find—"

"The ticket gate is over there. Do you have your ticket."

"Yes, I have my fucking ticket," Luca spits, aggressively rolling down the window.

"Okay!" Thorn says.

"Okay!" Luca repeats. Her arm isn't long enough to reach the ticket scanner so she has to get out of the car, tangling herself in her seat belt.

Thorn sighs in exasperation. "Why would you ever drive to work if it's like _this_?"

"I don't fucking know, I guess I'm just a fucking masochist!"

Luca's swerves onto the street. Thorn wonders if this was a fight. If Luca hadn't defused everything with innuendo Thorn probably would have kept being mean, and that makes Thorn a bad person, right? It's such a stupid thing to fight about, and Thorn feels her emotions snapping their restraints and metastasizing—

"Sorry for being a dick," Thorn says.

"I was a bigger dick," Luca scoffs.

Thorn leans back in her seat. Vague outlines of baseball courts scroll in the distance past the noise barrier, and streetlights flash through the car in safe, predictable intervals.

"I'm sorry, too," Luca says. "I hate cars, but that wasn't worth it."

In hindsight, there was an interesting, belligerent synergy to whatever just happened. Thorn doesn't really mind Luca getting under her skin if it keeps her close.

* * *

The Yokohama bay area is as sprawling and cluttered as any part of Tokyo Thorn's mother has wandered away in. She's 63, and Thorn has spent so much time researching dementia that it doesn't really hurt when she forgets Thorn is trans. Thorn helps with the groceries and feeds the chickens and scrubs the difficult corners around the _ōfurō_ when she can. She's an adult, improbably, making up the deficit in her housework from when she was a shut-in. Sooner or later the home will be hers.

She decides not to think about that part.

Thorn is sitting on the bench outside the tempura place. Her real name is written on the waiting list like a confession, and Thorn cowers in the afterglow of interpersonal conflict and honesty—everything seems better than usual, and that probably means it's temporary. Temporary the same way anything is: an emotion, a feeling, a person, a time—

Whenever Thorn thinks about asking Luca to be ~~her girlfriend~~ it triggers an avalanche, like: if dating is a prerequisite to marriage, is Thorn ready to take Luca's last name? Thorn definitely isn't ready to get married but she's thirty-one and trans and that kind of limits her options. Procrastination has stayed her hand but suicide hasn't become less of a certainty, and when Thorn's mother dies and Luca gives up and the rest of her meager support system slips away like torn fishnets, only her loneliness will remain.

It will be like all the times Thorn's hands have held each other and felt nothing but touch. She will use a knife. Fall soundlessly in her own forest, to bloom and decay as a rose.

Luca's adjusts her weight against Thorn's leather jacket.

Thorn wants to comb her fingers through Luca's hair, but if there's any more touch between them Luca might realize Thorn's toxic, dependent, possessive thoughts. They're just thoughts, but thoughts inform feelings and create impulses, and Thorn is terrified that Luca is the only thing keeping her alive. The potential damage grows the more that Thorn allows things to escalate, and she isn't sure if her heart can break again.

Trust is another kind of intimacy Thorn has only ever watched in other people.

"Natsume Thorn?" the waitress calls.

Luca groans into Thorn's shoulder. "Don't wanna get up. Sleepy girl."

Thorn's heart pounds. It's been happening almost every day since Thorn washed herself in Luca's bathroom and really considered what it means to have sex with her best friend. Everything she does has become awkward: a whip of exhilaration and despair thrown by the slightest implication. Heartache is probably the word. Interactions beget a quiet, painful awareness; visceral smell and touch and wonderful, ephemeral unloneliness: the idea of a possibility, or maybe just a woman.

Thorn walks into the restaurant.

The interior is a mess of grease-flecked faces and exposed ventilation, with no space to lean back in a chair. Only a restaurant that's genuinely good could ever become this used, and Thorn marvels.

"They serve it piece-by-piece here," Luca says through the noise. "Get what you want, okay?"

Thorn fixates on Luca's collarbone. Luca is pulling her tie out with one hand, distracted by her phone in the other, and if Thorn doesn't pass out immediately she's going to make some sort of obvious whimpering noise and communicate more than she's willing to— ~~and furthermore, who is Luca texting? Why is Luca texting instead of talking to Thorn?~~

Why is Thorn like this? She wasn't so attached when Luca was topless on her lap biting the side of her neck; granted, Thorn was drowning in her own expectations and the surprising biochemical indifference of a dysphoric body—

"You have something in your hair," Luca is saying.

Thorn paws at her bangs.

"Stop," Luca says, reaching across the table to pluck it. She brushes the rest of Thorn's hair back behind her ear. "There."

Thorn is going to explode. Damaged lamination on the wine list is an insufficient distraction. She's stared into Luca's eyes before, but now she notices how sharp her eyeliner is and how it compliments the slight sparkle in her eyeshadow so well. She has really pretty eyes. Maybe Thorn should tell her she has really pretty eyes. Or maybe that's a weird way to take the initiative. Maybe Luca doesn't even _want_ her to take the initiative anymore, but it would be even weirder to ask if she _could_ take the initiative, especially because that _is_ taking the initiative—

A traditional Japanese painting on the wall shows an early-1900s steamship awash in a raging storm and heavy seas. Thorn has always understood shipwrecks. The year Thorn was born, some guy found the _Titanic_ and then twelve years later Thorn would tiptoe into the kitchen at night to pause the VHS player on the exact shot where Kate Winslet was on the sofa—

The server places two clumps of fried vegetables on each plate. Thorn breaks her chopsticks unevenly and curses.

~~"How have I never noticed you're _this_ pretty," Thorn says.~~

Thorn doesn't know if their relationship is an actual _thing_. If she decides too soon maybe a secondary explosion will occur because of all the dangerous baggage Thorn is carrying, and the relationship will list so severely to Thorn's starboard that Luca won't be able to board a portside lifeboat before it all founders eighteen kilometers off the Irish coast—

The server returns with several slices of squash tempura. The server is not as pretty. Thorn is staring at Luca's chest. A hint of cleavage is visible every time Luca reaches forward, although Thorn isn't sure if this is deliberate or just a side-effect of having a body. Maybe it means Thorn should stop sexually objectifying the person she has sex with, and maybe Thorn is gross for wanting to— 

"What?" Luca says.

Thorn fumbles vegetables into her sauce bowl and splashes her sleeve.

Is there a functional difference between ~~girlfriends~~ and best friends who have sex, or is it just semantic? Thorn wants to say it's obvious but she has reservations, like how Luca texts back after an average of one to two business days, or how Thorn is so lonely that her brain doesn't discriminate between truth and confirmation bias.

Luca dabs Thorn's sleeve with a napkin, accidentally brushing her hand over Thorn's ~~scars~~ wrist, and Thorn suppresses a tremble.

~~"What are we?" Thorn asks.~~

Thorn receives two pieces of shrimp tempura and no answers.

"Something's on your mind," Luca deduces, spitting a tail onto Thorn's plate.

~~"I really want to kiss you right now," Thorn says.~~

"Um," Thorn stutters.

Thorn wants to do more than kiss. Wants to see spit form a long messy trail between their lips. Wants Luca to wipe it off with a laugh and keep going, plunging further into chaos—

The server returns with fried fish tempura. Catch of the day.

"Do any of these have bones?" Thorn says, fully aware that the fish have bones.

"Just take a bite," Luca says.

Thorn thinks about teeth. Her pulse is so fast that she feels herself strained against her own skin and bad habits. Euphoria is the opposite of a meltdown, in that it's still a meltdown but it's terrifying for good reasons instead of bad. Maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe Thorn shouldn't worry about the risks or the uncertainty, and she should just fucking _say something_ —

"You are _so_ flustered," Luca observes. "I like it."

"I like you, too," Thorn blurts, completely misunderstanding the context.

"Oh," Luca smiles devilishly. "What are we gonna do about that?"

"Um... Whatever you want?"

Luca takes another bite without breaking eye contact. "As much as I love that you value my needs, _that_ is your cop-out answer, and you are holding back."

Thorn balks. "We're in public!"

"We are," Luca says. "Do you think a bra is the only thing I'm not wearing?"

Thorn chokes, and Luca pops another few buttons on her shirt, letting it plunge spectacularly down to—

"Stop holding back," Luca says.

"We should pay the check."

" _I'm_ paying the check. _You_ are going to be honest with yourself—"

"Okay. Do you want to go back to your apartment?"

"It's where I live."

"You know what I mean."

"I know exactly what you mean," Luca says, fishing a rib out of her mouth with indelicate fingers. "I wanna hear you say it."

Thorn storms to the front of the restaurant and pays the tab in full. She needs to get out of here before she does something impulsive, even though Luca's shameless flirting is definitely not 'red'—do people really fuck in bars? Nightclub bathrooms? The idea of tension building to a breaking point without security or a change of clothes is incredibly hot, and Thorn is even more curious about Luca's history and willingness—

"You're cute when you take charge," Luca says.

"We're going."

"Be honest with yourself. Are we really going to make it back to my apartment?"

"I'm trying to."

"Is that _really_ what you want? You don't wanna throw me into that alley and have your way—"

Thorn imagines it. Vividly. Feels the call of meager privacy and forgotten walls, of skin pressed between concrete and more skin; wet fabric against the indifferent, stained sky—

"Oh, you thought about it," Luca breathes. "You're thinking about it right now—"

Thorn stumbles back into the car, breathing heavily against the inevitable.

"Everyone has a breaking point, Thorn," Luca says. "God, I wanna see yours so bad. I wanna see you _give in_ , all the way—"

"I want to kiss you," Thorn blurts.

"Of course you do," Luca says. "If you can still talk, you haven't given in."

Thorn almost cries in frustration, her whole body aching as Luca reverses far too quickly out of the parking lot.

"Aww, you can't take it? Do I need to pull over so you can fuck me in my car?" Luca says. "Should we find another parking ramp?"

"Oh my god, no, I—is it even possible to fuck like that?"

"Yes, Thorn. I lived out of this car back when I was a camgirl. I did everything imaginable. Does that answer your question?"

If Thorn is being honest, that kind of begets further questions.

"Tell me what else you want."

Thorn stutters. "I want to have sex."

"I know. Describe it."

Thorn's mind blanks out as Luca accelerates onto the freeway.

"Imagine you're kissing me," Luca says. "My hands are in your hair, and it's hot and heavy, and you can feel me wet against you. What do you do?"

"I want to take your shirt off—"

"You don't wanna fuck me in my work uniform?"

"What if it gets dirty?"

"It will. I know how much of a mess I can make."

"Keep it on," Thorn says without thinking. "I don't care. I just want you on me. Like last time when we were on your couch—"

"Oh god, that was hot—you want me on top again? _All_ over you?"

"Yeah. What about you? What do—"

"I don't fucking care. I just wanna grind our clits together until we both come—"

"Please," Thorn says, squeezing her thighs. She's vaguely conscious of the skyline, passing in a dazzling, incomprehensible blur. The vibration of the car feels so much more intense when the seam of her shorts is pressing into her—

"Oh kitten, we're almost there," Luca breathes. "You can't take much more of this, can you?"

"I can," Thorn lies.

"I can't," Luca says, shaking. "I need you inside me right now—"

"How? You're driving!"

"Just finger me. Please—"

"That's _really_ not safe!"

"It's fine, I'll just put her on cruise control—"

"That isn't how cruise control works!"

"God damn it!" Luca says, biting her lip. "We should have just fucked in the stupid alley!"

Thorn nods. "Yeah. I really did think about it."

"I know—just hold on a little bit more," Luca says. "Tell me what you thought about doing."

"I wanted you to throw me in and have _your_ way—"

"How bad? Are you wet thinking about me—"

"Yeah," Thorn admits. "Yeah—wait, you just missed the turn again—"

"God fucking dammit! Why don't you drive?"

"Because I'm in the passenger seat? And I don't have a license?"

"Who the fuck cares, I don't have mine either!"

"You—wait, what? You don't have one?"

"Oh yeah, I'm a bad girl," Luca says. "I'm just freeballing it. In more ways than one, actually—"

"Why the fuck are you driving without a license!"

"What—because I can't pass the stupid fucking test, okay?"

"What?" Thorn exclaims. "I can't—why—are we there yet? I can't believe—"

"Yes, we're fucking _there_! I'm just can't fucking parallel park when I'm this turned on!"

"Luca, I cannot believe—"

"Just shut up and think about me domming you, okay? Don't fucking think about the law. Just descend into your subby little haze and stay there!"

"Alright, I just—you're still like a meter away from the curb—"

"Oh, fucking _bite me_ , Thorn. I'll bite back. I have my big girl teeth."

"I'd really like that, actually—wait, start turning right now—"

"Oh, fuck off! I'm gonna backseat drive this stick shift right up your ass!"

Luca finally gives up and doesn't care. When Thorn gets out of the car she's barely able to stand, trembling—

"Thorn," Luca says, impossibly close. "Tell me not to hold back."

"Please," Thorn says, backing into the elevator. "Don't hold back."

  1. Luca charges Thorn into the elevator and kisses her, impulsive to the teeth—

  2. Thorn feels spit against her insistent stubble, lips giving way to bite as they breathe into each other's mouths and kiss again.

"God," Thorn moans—

  3. "Just call me by my name," Luca says, and cuts Thorn off before she can, wrenching her into another wall.

  4. "Yeah?" Luca says.

Thorn shakes her head 'yes' so many times that Luca has to hold her chin still, 5. and she succumbs when Luca breathes _can I touch your chest_ —the answer is already yes. 6. As hands drip up Thorn's stomach into her bra, Thorn almost believes that she's enough, until she believes that she's enough; 7. not like magic, or anything, but a choice: touch and awareness and something Thorn doesn't trust enough to call 'trust', but that's what it is—



  1. _You're in control,_ Luca says. Thorn ~~almost~~ believes it, 9. pushing back into questions and skin she's never found before, and when Luca asks 10. if she can touch between Thorn's legs Thorn says yes because 11. she isn't afraid of what Luca will find there, because 12. that's what _I want you_ means, and 14. _I want you so bad, Thorn, please_ —



  1. _You really let go,_ Luca's expression says, awed and shameless—




Behind the locked door, Thorn kneels to unbuckle her boots, reeling.

"You look good like that," Luca says. Her voice is husky, hand pulling Thorn's hair to tilt her head— _ow,_ Thorn says, and everything stops immediately but _no, it's not bad pain, keep going, green; please, Luca; green_ , and Thorn's knees press into the carpet while she tastes the outside of Luca's skirt—

"Thorn—eat me out," Luca says.

"Yeah," Thorn says, breathless. "I have no idea what I'm doing."

"I don't care," Luca laughs. "Just fuck it up. You've got this."

Thorn kisses salt and bare skin, spurred by rough hands in her hair; _tell me if I'm fucking your neck up or anything,_ Luca says, blunt practicality waxing erotic in Thorn's mouth, and Thorn thinks about her front teeth and which words her tongue is supposed to spell and when Luca could have slipped her underwear off without Thorn noticing, unless she was never—

Luca braces against the wall, unashamed as Thorn tastes the evidence of the last hour or so of, well—foreplay, honestly. Bodies are incredibly warm, prone to sweat and discomfort and incredible reactions. Spent kisses drip down Thorn's chest, collecting under her bra, _just like that_ —

Maybe Luca isn't playing it up. Maybe Thorn is actually doing a good job for once—she still hasn't internalized that Luca wants to fuck her actual body, and _I swear to god, Thorn, stop writing novels on my vagina and just flick my clit like you're illiterate_ —Thorn would snort if she wasn't trying to comprehend how much fluid a human being is capable of creating, or whether it's easier to wash out of clothes or the carpet, or if she should even bother to swallow—

Careless aftermath splatters onto Thorn's legs as she separates, breathing; Luca pants _no—no—no, no, please, I am so fucking far past teasing_ and squeals when Thorn returns with inexpert fingers. Thorn is so far outside of her comfort zone that she can only be exhilarated, indulgent without afterthought, wrist trembling from exertion, painfully aroused against the inside of her shorts and nowhere close to touching herself—

"Fuck," Luca pants. "That's a good girl—"

Thorn hears herself blush. Luca is pulling Thorn's hair back now, as she—well, honestly Luca is fucking Thorn's face more than Thorn can reciprocate, a grateful mask to Thorn's inexperience, not that the taste is _bad_ , just unacquired and spilling overwhelmingly down her shirt and _fuck, right there—no teeth, no teeth, just like—yes, keep going_ , and Thorn keeps going, awed and cramping until Luca's legs give out and she comes so viciously that Thorn almost panics—

"Yeah?" Thorn asks—

"Fuck yeah," Luca says, wrenching Thorn into a kiss before Thorn can swallow her mouth clean—

"Ow, ow, fuck—" Thorn cries. "No, no, no, that's worse—"

"Oh god, what am I doing?"

"Crushing my ankle—just, ok, ok, that's better—"

Luca collapses uncomfortably into Thorn's ribs. Her shirt is soaked warm and transparent with, well—discharge, probably, which is outrageously hot and kind of gross. The soreness in her jaw reminds her of the dentist. She might still have a healthy amount of trepidation about dentistry, but the crunchy wisdom teeth dreams speak more to phobia—this is _absolutely_ not the right time to be reflecting on this—

"You went, right?" Thorn says.

"Obviously, goofball."

Thorn starts thinking about oral hygiene. "Were we supposed to use a dental dam?"

"Nah. I wanted you to taste me," Luca says. "Should we get you off, too?"

"I'm so exhausted. No way."

"Oh thank god, I have work tomorrow."

Thorn takes stock of herself. "How do you get _this_ wet."

"That was all you, thorn-in-my-side."

" ~~What do I even say to that? How are you this outrageously cute—wait, but holy shit, did I really—~~ Okay," Thorn stutters. "But, like, physically. How? What is this?"

"I have a wicked strong pelvic floor. Took years to train that up—here, stick your finger back in and I'll flex on you. Feel that?"

"Yeah, I felt that. God, I think I need a change of clothes."

"Sorry," Luca says, unapologetic. "Throw those in the wash and put it on fifteen. Hop in the shower and I'll grab you a sweatshirt."

Thorn waits without undressing. At this point it's more stubborn habit than dysphoria, although being naked would probably make Luca's tutorial on how to use the washing machine a lot more stressful. The shower is even more mystifying. Last time Thorn cleaned up in the bathroom, she gave up and used the sink and a wet towel and only sort of felt like a country girl.

Luca tosses a bundle of clothes on the bathroom floor. "Hey. I had fun. How are you?"

"I'm okay," Thorn says, almost disbelieving. Her body is one big cramp. "That went okay. You?"

"On the verge of passing out. We really gotta make you cum next time. Tell future me to stop bottoming so hard."

"We can try," Thorn shrugs. "I need to pee."

"Don't fall in," Luca says. "Unconscious Luca says spoon her and stop stealing her blankets."

"Goodnight!" Thorn says.

"Love you too!" Luca says.

Thorn can't figure out what that means.

Later, in the shower, Thorn briefly considers masturbating. The arousal is still under the surface, and maybe she needs to ease into sharing it, but part of her is grateful she kept it there. It still feels like her darkest secret.

When Thorn sees herself in the mirror, she realizes Luca might be the only person in the world who wants her body the way it is.

It's not a happy realization. The person in the mirror is just a girl, after all, and Thorn has been more cruel to her than she ever deserved.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning in this chapter for trans women experiencing lost time dysphoria, period/menstruation dysphoria, being misgendered in the medical system, and use of prescription drugs (for hormone replacement). There's also some pretty intense mentions of transphobia in past tense.

The rainstorm hits as soon as the train departs. Hordes of drenched schoolchildren slip around with the turns, and Thorn curls tighter in her seat. She kind of misses being a kid, which is weird, because she doesn't miss being a boy: she misses Ichika and Shogo and the pieces of romance and growth they shared along the way. If letting someone go is the ultimate act of love, Thorn has never quite loved them enough.

Grief settles into an adjacent seat in the form of a high school girl, and comparisons intrude. Thorn would also have worn a skirt rolled up past the knee. Not too revealing, but overconfident enough to share in Ichika's delinquency without a second thought. She would have loved herself for it. Loved herself for not holding back. Watched in distant awe as her shell filled with personality and became her. School could have been real: rough and cold surfaces, rooms, relationships, bodies next to each other, and brains that made sense.

Something about the speed and the rain makes thoughts easier to lose.

* * *

Luca sits under rain-battered metal and fluorescent station signs, silly and adrift as an entire school disembarks around her. 

"So?" Luca says.

"I got it," Thorn says. Her voice betrays her and Luca gives a concerned glance.

"You got it," she repeats. "You got hormones?"

"Yeah," Thorn says. "Here."

Luca rifles through the damp paper bag. "Huh. Who the fuck is—oh no."

~~"Yeah. And I had to listen to them talking about how _that man's prescription doesn't match his name_ , and every fucking time I told them my name is Thorn and I'm a woman they just kept going, _his prescription_ , _his name_ , _thank you, sir_. I wanted to fucking kill myself just to prove how much it hurt."~~

"It was bad," Thorn says instead.

"Do you want to finish this bento box and wait out the rain until—oh. Hey there."

Thorn falls into Luca's shoulder and cries into fabric. She has cried like this far too many times—now that Thorn thinks about it, Luca has never cried into Thorn's shoulder, and not for a lack of things worth crying over. At least the relationship kind of balances out. Thorn does all of the crying, and Luca has all of the orgasms, and the total amount of wet bodily responses kind of breaks even in a weird fucked up way.

"They were intentionally misgendering me," Thorn admits, unprompted. "It's not that I _let_ it get me down, it just gets me down."

"Bullies usually want someone else to suffer more than they are," Luca says. "They're sad, tiny ants who make all their pain and anger someone else's problem because they won't deal with it."

Thorn separates and picks at the bento box. Pickled plums are sour and angry and Thorn is surprisingly happy with them.

"I should know," Luca adds. "I used to be an ant."

Thorn mulls over a plum pit. "Were you a transphobic ant?"

"Nah. I was something else."

This might be one of those times where Luca says something and only realizes the implications later. Thorn decides to let it go.

"What I mean is—it's not your fault people are awful to you," Luca offers. "The shit they give you is just a helping of their own damage."

Thorn swallows, and nods. "Should we wait out the storm?"

Eyes meet, hinting at something playful, and Luca shrugs. "Fuck it."

* * *

Rain hasn't been Thorn's friend since she was a kid. Adulthood brought responsibility, obedience, anxiety over water-damaged electronics, and a healthy understanding of tetanus. Even without a cubicle, most grown-ups are stuffy and square and honestly, Thorn would rather grow back down.

Luca kicks water onto Thorn's legs and grins. Thorn kicks back.

"You wanna fight me? Then fight!" Luca shouts.

Lightning strikes somewhere across the bay.

"Punk," Luca says.

"Punks stick together," Thorn says.

"Punks don't back down from a fight. Without the spirit you're just a hot girl in a leather jacket."

Thorn sidesteps some elementary school kids busy harassing a snail. Finding comfort in reckless spontaneity has seemed like the secret to other people's healthy relationships, but in practice Thorn can't think of a response.

Luca waits until the children are out of earshot before she says, "You look good when you're wet."

"Whatever."

"Uh-oh, she's getting flustered—"

"No, I'm not," Thorn lies.

"Her pride."

"Shut up."

"Her hubris," Luca says. "It's okay, though. We're both soaked. I mean—that's that you wanted, right?"

Thorn blushes. "You're awful."

"I'm the worst," Luca says. "Kiss me in the rain?"

Thorn waits for an elderly couple to round a corner and does it. Some part of Luca's composure falls. It's romantic. They probably both think it's romantic. Thorn still feels like a kid, but now it's a romantic adult-kid way that doesn't make any sense.

Luca presses Thorn against the side of a stranger's garage and leans in closer. "You know, I only ever wear a bra if I wanna watch you struggle to take it off."

"That's evil."

"It's because I like when you stare."

Thorn is actually flustered now. Public is scary. She should keep scraping her deadname off her pills.

Thankfully, Luca gives her a way out: "Gonna make an occasion of those tonight?"

"It's no big deal."

"We can make it a big deal. You're finally on birth control. You know what that means, right?"

"If only," Thorn says. "I wish I had a uterus."

"Oh, fuck off. Seriously?"

"I'm serious. I genuinely wish I bled every month. I wish I could wake up with blood on my sheets. I wish it hurt."

"Yeah," Luca says, thinking. The rainstorm around them becomes just a rainstorm.

"Yeah," Thorn repeats. "I carry tampons everywhere I go, and nobody ever asks me for one because I'm always trans before I'm a woman. There's basic, fundamental parts of being assigned female at birth that I'll _never_ authentically have, and that fucking sucks a lot."

Luca pauses. "I get that."

"Do you?" Thorn says. "Like, even if I have bottom surgery, I won't be able to get wet, and I'll only bleed while it's healing. The skeletal structure and voice drop are more or less permanent. The thirty years in the wrong body _are_ permanent. Most of what I want is impossible, and I feel like I'm surviving on denial."

"Oh, sweetie. That's raw. That's really raw."

Water squeezes in Thorn's socks with every step. It's probably better to carry her shoes and go barefoot. Closer to the ground, at least.

"I'm sorry for not taking you seriously," Luca says.

Thorn keeps walking. Emotions are tangling up somewhere near her diaphragm, and she inspects a loose end hesitantly. "So what is it actually like?"

"Periods? Bad," Luca says. "Like, unmitigatedly bad. Heavy, painful; bleeding through my pants in public. It was probably less bad when I was a kid but I don't remember much from then."

"Fuck, I'm sorry."

"I don't miss it," Luca says, abrupt.

Thorn shuts up. She's still being too honest and going too deep. Being honest is important but being too honest is how things start falling apart.

"I understand grieving that my body can't be mine," Luca continues. "Like, authentic parts of girlhood that I can never have. Those are gone for me, too."

Thorn nods.

"I got you, okay?" Luca says. "We're not the same, but your grief isn't alone."

"I wish yours wasn't either."

Luca pauses. "It isn't."

Luca tries to lace her fingers around Thorn's, grappling unsuccessfully through mutual uncoordination. Wet clothing weighs on Thorn's body, enunciating every point and flat surface. The implication of open wounds, barely hidden, fills the remainder of the walk.

Eventually, Thorn opens her mouth to the weather and swallows it with three pills.

She doesn't care who notices.

* * *

  1.   2.   3.   4.   5.   6.   7.   8.   9.   10.   11.   12. 

  1.   2. "Trauma," Luca says.




"Yeah, right?" Thorn says. "That got real."

Luca slings her wet clothes into the shower with an unattractive splat.

Nudity is complicated. Inconsequential and benign nudity is probably more intimate than sex, all things considered, although clothes are Thorn's necessary defense against her assigned gender. She keeps her shorts on, just to be safe, and if Luca notices the shape of Thorn's penis, she genuinely doesn't care.

"Yakisoba?" Luca says.

"Are you gonna put real vegetables in?"

"Fuck no."

Thorn sniffs at Luca's expense and turns on the television. The Tokyo sprawl disappears over the horizon behind the newscaster, smothered with fog. Despite her mother, Thorn has always been a city girl at heart; tall buildings, anonymity, and technology made her a safe and inconsequential speck. It's virtually impossible to meet the same transphobe twice, even on the same commute.

"Hey," Luca says. "So you know the menstruation thing? About waking up with blood on your sheets?"

"I'm sorry about that—"

"I can make that happen."

Thorn blinks. "God, how?"

"I have options."

Eye contact briefly prevents Thorn from speaking, plausibly romantic before Thorn bursts into giggles.

"I'm genuinely terrified," Thorn says. ~~"Like, of you. Not in a bad way. Just in a real way. I never really know what you're thinking."~~

"Seriously. Do you trust me?"

 ~~"Yes,"~~ Thorn says. "I'm trying to."

"You're doing good. Is it uncomfortable for me to be proud of you?"

"Maybe?"

"Then I'm just happy," Luca smiles.

The ceiling is nothing like stars, but Thorn remembers laying in fields of grass and abandoned tires, watching conversation rise into the air like smoke. She finds that again. Feels as seventeen as the whole world.

Maybe she's only ever been a girl.

"Are you good?" Luca says.

"Yeah," Thorn says. ~~"Kind of. I'm still afraid to talk about it."~~

For just a moment, Thorn is sure that Luca knows exactly what she's thinking.

~~"I guess we're already more than friends, but I _want_ to be more than friends, on purpose. Maybe even more than that," Thorn says. "I don't know. I just appreciate you a lot."~~

"Me too," Luca says. Thorn realizes they're going to kiss. It feels kind of like the first time. 

"You have really pretty eyes," Thorn says.

"Oh," Luca breathes. "All the better to see you with."

Thorn recoils. "I swear to god! I was having a moment!"

"Yeah? Were you about to get all mushy?"

"No," Thorn lies.

"But you _were_ thinking about it?"

"Well—now the moment is over."

"Then kiss me again. Let's have another moment."

"Are you gonna say something awful again?"

"I'll stop talking when there's stuff in—oh geez—"

Thorn kisses her stupid mouth shut, pressing deeper as Luca closes her legs around Thorn and rolls both of them open. A finger asks at Thorn's waistband.

"What do you want?" Thorn blurts. She knows the answer.

"A number of things. First I wanna play with you."

"And then?"

"I thought maybe we could see how many times you can cum."

Thorn shivers. Thinks about every kind of thrusting and rubbing and un-denial that comes with using sex organs—

"I wanna put you in my mouth," Luca says.

"We can try, but like—you know..."

"I don't. And if you force yourself to do something you hate because you think I'll abandon you otherwise, I'll kick your ass."

"I'm good, I'm good—just, like... be gentle," Thorn says. "I don't really know what to expect."

"Do you want to find out?"

"I—" Thorn says, in her smallest voice. "Yeah. Just, like—you'll still treat me like I'm a girl, right?"

"You _are_ a girl, silly," Luca laughs. "You're my girl. I got you."

Something about that fills Thorn with a lot more warmth than she knows how to describe. She's already cried during sex, and severely fucked up during sex—she can think of a lot of awful outcomes, but she might not _need_ to.

"Can I pull your shorts down?" Luca says.

Thorn nods. She knows she has an erection.

"Cute panties. Especially when you're wet—"

"I wore them for you," Thorn admits. Luca smiles against her thigh.

"Are you ready?"

Thorn closes her eyes. It feels a lot like getting a vaccine, in that it's painful and ultimately good for her. "Yeah."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Trepidation gives way to a gentle, weird perspective of Luca's teeth as Luca slips her tongue—Thorn is really worried about the taste, although Luca doesn't seem to mind. Hair tickles her stomach as Luca somehow finds every secret place on—honestly, Thorn has never really sat down and determined what feels good. She probably should. For herself. Nothing really compares but it's kind of like when she accidentally sprays the shower on a painfully sensitive place under the foreskin except somehow she's riding that pain to completion, and it's more intense than—

"Mm-hmm?" Luca asks.

"Oh my god," Thorn pants. "Keep going."

Thorn feels her hips wrenched deeper down the couch. She's moaning. Like actually moaning involuntarily, at a higher pitch than she's ever managed to practice, vaguely aware that Luca has to hold her writhing still, and _fuck_ , there's nowhere to pull away to and she _loves_ this and _oh god, oh god, oh god—fuck! Fuck, stop—_

"All good?" Luca says.

"Holy _shit_ , my whole face tingles—"

"That's what happens when you hyperventilate, goofball."

"Holy _shit_ ," Thorn repeats. "Yeah, I just—I need to catch my breath—"

Luca pets Thorn's hair flat. "You're making the most stupidly adorable faces."

"What the fuck are you _doing_? How is this so much better than masturbation?"

Luca grins. "You're easy. You're like the perfect size for me to work against the roof of my mouth. And like, I'm gonna be real, you're _really_ turned on."

"Holy _shit_ ," Thorn repeats. "I have _never_ been that loud—oh god, fuck, that's sensitive—"

"Be as loud as you want, babygirl. Caught your breath yet?"

"No, just—keep going," Thorn says. She disappears into Luca's mouth again, overpowered by raw nerves and indelicate sensation and whatever the fuck combination of places Luca is hitting. All she can do is pull Luca's hair harder, helplessly biting a pillow just to hold something back—

"Get that out of your mouth," Luca says. "I—please let me hear everything. Please."

"Won't your neighbors—oh my _god_ —"

"Yeah? Scream my name so they know I'm the one doing this to you—"

Arousal sinks deeper into Thorn's chest; she unsqueezes her eyes to watch Luca plunge her hand between her legs, already dripping with—the only reason she's still going is because Luca keeps discovering things that don't work, which is okay, because how else would she find—she can barely even process what's happening—

"Oh god—ow, that hurts—ow, stop! Stop—"

"It's okay. It's okay, I'm stopping. What's going on?"

"Too much," Thorn pants. "I can't—you're not doing anything wrong, I just can't—this is ridiculous—"

"Oh honey," Luca says. "What do you need?"

"Keep going, I just—I think your mouth is too much," Thorn says. "Come here?"

Eyes wild, Luca pounces onto the couch. "Hey."

"Oh, hi," Thorn says. "Yeah. So maybe like, something slower? But keep—please—"

Luca grinds as slowly as possible. "Yeah? Keep it soft and romantic?"

It would be so easy for penetration to happen, and the tease makes it even more intense. Thorn aches. She's dripping onto herself and doesn't care.

"You know what the hottest thing in the world is?" Luca says. "Staring into someone's eyes, knowing exactly how good you're making them feel. Knowing exactly what it means. Fighting as hard as you can to see absolutely everything, no matter how hard you come—no matter what—just holding on—until—"

Thorn starts shaking. She can't stop. It starts in her legs and chases around to her breath and her arms and her teeth and hides somewhere in her gut. Craving might be the word.

"I'm doing this to you," Luca says. "I'm really doing this—god, just look at you—"

"Yeah," Thorn says, broken.

Luca gives in and grinds Thorn's clit against hers. Thorn can see the exact moment when Luca hits the edge and doesn't come, falling back into a slow ache—she's doing this for Thorn. Fuck. She's doing this on purpose for—

"Is this good?" Luca breathes. Am I wet enough for you?"

Thorn mewls. Lets Luca fuck her so slow that it hurts. Passion might be a better word. Whatever it is, it's so embarrassing that she can only be fascinated, trembling in awe as she feels just how wet—

"Do you wanna be inside me," Luca whispers.

"Not really," Thorn says.

"You're so good," Luca laughs, holding Thorn's head still. "You're so fucking good."

Thorn opens her mouth and gasps as Luca viciously grinds them back together.

"No apologies," Luca says. She'd be grinning in victory if she wasn't so far gone—Thorn can tell how much Luca wants it, and how hard it must be not to beg—fuck, that kind of turns Thorn on in an entirely different way—

"Luca," Thorn moans. Thighs shudder around her, losing rhythm until Thorn grinds her fingers faster across Luca's clit—

"Fuck you," Luca moans. "This was supposed to be for you—"

"Yeah. I wanna—I think seeing you is what it's gonna take—"

"Then do it. Make me come. Make me come on you right now. Thorn—"

Rhythm and coordination stop mattering. Thorn should just give in and let it happen without worrying about the shame or the mess, not that it would make any difference at this point; the details of form and body hair blend together and Thorn hits her wall and it becomes sensation; a breath, and she feels Luca contract and squirt warm over her stomach and still—

"Yeah?" Luca pants.

"Almost," Thorn says. She's shaking so badly that her teeth are chattering. It started as a promising sign and now she's a little concerned that it's some sort of symptom—

Luca holds Thorn down with her thumb and rubs tiny circles into—this should be enough. This should be more than enough, and Thorn can feel her orgasm buzzing under her skin until she can't feel her legs—

"Just fucking kiss me," Luca says, and Thorn does, still disbelieving, trembling across her whole body until she can't stop—it doesn't feel like orgasm at all, but as Luca pulls their mouths together by the hair and says _Thorn, Thorn, Thorn—come with me, come with me, come with me—_ it might as well be.

Sound leaves Thorn's mouth in shudders. She's trying to laugh but everything is scrambled.

Making sense of things takes a while.

"Woah," Luca says.

"Yeah," Thorn says.

"That went all the way."

"Yeah."

Blood tingles back into Thorn's face as she stumbles into the kitchen, finding almost every cup in the apartment dirty. There's a set of wine glasses, a thermos from the San Francisco bay area, a vase more fitting for a memorial, and a mug that says 'best dad'.

"Don't use that," Luca says. "Complicated."

Thorn replaces the trauma mug and drinks from the faucet with her hands.

"Did you?" Luca says.

"I don't know. Nothing came out."

"Not every girl is a squirter," Luca says. She pulls the couch cover off in sparks of static and stumbles to the washing machine. "It felt like you came. You were shaking like a leaf."

"It didn't feel like a regular orgasm, though. I don't know."

"I fucked your brains out," Luca declares. "You came. Now we have to take a shower."

Thorn somehow understands her body less than she ever has. It feels good. New, maybe. Better.

**Author's Note:**

> There's probably going to be one more chapter. I already made most of the meat now it just has to be processed.


End file.
